Profile

Tension electrifies the relationship between a psychiatrist and her psychotic patient when, in Koehler's promising debut, the patient becomes a suspect in series of mutilation-murders of professional women. The killer's profile, circulated to therapists in an unnamed university town by a police consultant, exactly fits that of Lisa Robbins's patient, Philip Schroeder, who soon starts following her between appointments. Detective Ray Koepp, suspecting that one of Lisa's patients is the killer, pressures her to disclose that patient's identity, but Lisa, bound by doctor-client privilege, refuses. Schroeder's van is spotted at the scene of the next killing; the 911 caller reporting the body turns out to be Lisa's husband, Jack, whom Lisa believes is having an affair. Fingerprints point to the victim's ex-boyfriend, but the DNA tests clear him, and Koepp builds a case against Lisa and Jack that takes matters right up to the novel's hostage-and-shootout finale. Koehler knows how to entertain, but his story is flawed by sketchy police procedures and an overuse of coincidence and intuition to connect the plot threads. (Aug.)